Dr. Marc Fasanella teaches Ecological Art, Architecture and Design in the Sustainability
Studies Program at Stony Brook University. Having taught Art and Design at the university
level for thirty years, his current work focuses on regenerative design and ecology
based neighborhood development. Marc holds a PhD in Art & Art Education from New York
University and is a recipient of the Long Island University Trustees Award for Scholarly
Achievement for writing and design in the spirit of 19th century luminary William
Morris.

Raised by a progressive educator and a self-taught social realist painter, Dr. Fasanella
was exposed to social justice and environmental activism at an early age. His parents
were part of the nationwide struggle for civil rights. As a youth he participated
in the migrant farmworker movement led by Cesar Chavez and Pete Seeger's environmental
initiative Clearwater's Great Hudson River Revival. His many hours spent exploring
the forest and wetland ecology of the undeveloped land adjacent to his childhood home
instilled in him a visceral understanding of the web of nature and insight into the
effects of development as the forest in which he found a spiritual home gave way to
suburban sprawl.

Dr. Fasanella began his academic training in the New York State University system
as an undergraduate in Industrial Arts and Technology Education where he was introduced
to design philosophy and received technical training ranging from drafting and graphics
to ceramics, metalwork, plastics, power technology, woodwork, electronics and photography.
Throughout the years of his college education he apprenticed himself to the practical
trades of estate gardening, restoration carpentry and stone masonry. A semester abroad
studying studio art, Renaissance culture and Italian language in Florence Italy exposed
him to the impact of art, architecture and design on the evolution of culture. After
receiving his bachelor's degree he pursued an MA at New York University in Post-Secondary
Technology and Industrial Education - his goal: to teach students to use industrial
skill to produce socially responsible design. During this time his concentrated academic
interests were passive solar architecture, problem solving and the British Craft,
Design and Technology method of education. After completing his MA he became a doctoral
candidate at NYU in Art and Art Education where he studied aesthetics and the philosophy
of nature. His dissertation, The Environmental Design of Jones Beach State Park, delved
into the aesthetic, economic, geologic, political and environmental impact of the
Park’s initial construction.

Dr. Fasanella joined the Arts & Media faculty of Southampton College in 1991, received
tenure in 1997 and achieved the rank of Full Professor in 2002. During this time he
revitalized the Art Education, Digital Art, Graphic Design and Printmaking curricula
and studios, advised up to 60 students, as well as supervised internships and student
teaching placements. Dr. Fasanella served as the Southampton College faculty union
President from 2001 to 2004. Prior to the closure of Southampton College for financial
reasons Dr. Fasanella was selected by the administration to serve on a task force
that would move the college toward a unified core, eliminate departmental distinctions
and develop environmentally themed majors.

Upon the closure of Southampton College Dr. Fasanella opened and ran Artisan Gallery
a coastally themed venue for art, craft and design in Hampton Bays, NY. As a gallery
owner and independent curator for cultural institutions across New York State, Dr.
Fasanella has produced widely reviewed exhibits featuring the work of notable artists
such as George Rickey, Moses Soyer, Robert Gwathmey, David Burliuk, Jim McMullan,
Richard Mayhew and Milton Glaser.

Fasanella enthusiastically returned to teaching as a founding faculty member of Stony
Brook Southampton, an innovative undergraduate program initiated at his former campus
under the stewardship of Stony Brook University. In this position he co-authored
the Environmental Humanities curriculum, served as Director of the Avram Gallery and
Art Director for the literary journal of the Masters program in writing. Upon the
relocation of the Sustainability Studies Program to the Main Campus of Stony Brook
University, Dr. Fasanella worked with the university architect to design the Sustainability
Studies studio, curated student
Environmental Art exhibits, and continues to draft a series of new ecology based curriculum initiatives.

Dr. Fasanella has also
written and
lectured about his father, whose work is in the permanent collections of the American Folk Art Museum, the Fenimore
Art Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Smithsonian Museum of American Art
and is displayed in many other museums and public locations through a Public Domain
Project. He is currently writing a monograph on his father’s work for Pomegranate
Press due out in the Fall of 2017

Dr. Fasanella lives in a restored historic farmhouse on the East End of Long Island,
New York with his wife Anne and two children Mia and Michael.

Commentary upon the advent and evolving culture of the present millennium.

The Comfortable Landscape: How We Perceive Nature and Overlook Nurture. A volume of illustrated essays and case
studies that investigate how aesthetic notions of the built and natural environment
have evolved in the Western World and an introduction to a prescriptive ecological
aesthetic.